United States

AAPT SM 20

Informal STEM Programs: Why do students come and what makes them stay?

iper

informal stem

minecraft

hands-on

coding

physics

The 2020 AAPT Virtual Summer Meeting brought together physics educators from around the globe to learn about the latest in physics theory, research methodology and education from leaders in their field. The program featured plenary speakers, sessions, workshops and many special activities.

For more information please visit the 2020 AAPT Virtual Summer Meeting page at: https://www.aapt.org/Conferences/SM2020/index.cfm.


The 2020 AAPT Virtual Summer Meeting brought together physics educators from around the globe to learn about the latest in physics theory, research methodology and education from leaders in their field. 

poster

Thinking Like a Physicist in the Middle-grades: Promising Results from 7th-grade Students Studying Magnetism

Student evaluation of more or better experimental data in classical and quantum mechanics

Choosing the Right Graduate Program for You

The additional benefit of working in same-gender groups on students’ self-efficacy in introductory physics

Exploratory factor analysis of the Quantum Mechanics Concept Assessment

A New Model for Public Engagement Partnerships With High Schools

Physics Motivation and Math Anxiety at a Small Liberal Arts College

Investigating a collaborative group exam as an instructional tool to address student reasoning difficulties that remain even after instruction

Preliminary Results for the Effect of Mousebites on Energy Resolution in the CMS HGCAL

Simply having a virtual reality planetarium facility to immerse students beneath a projected night sky in and of itself is insufficient to automatically ensure student learning occurs. Modern teaching strategies, like active learning, have consistently shown to move students toward a better and longer-lasting understanding in classrooms, and one naturally wonders how this plays out in the planetarium. This observational study evaluated the nature of active learning-based formative assessment conversation cycles in the planetarium and, using follow up clinical interviews, identified rationale or barriers to their use. A synthesis of collected data found scant evidence of complete formative assessment conversation cycles, but varying degrees of interactivity between the planetarium lecturer and the audience were observed. Similar to what researchers report about typical K-12 classrooms, the results of this study reveal that active learning featuring assessment conversation cycles is largely absent in the planetarium programs sampled.

Nature of Formative Assessment-Based Active Learning in Interactive Planetarium Shows

technical paper

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Thinking Like a Physicist in the Middle-grades: Promising Results from 7th-grade Students Studying Magnetism

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